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Pan's Labyrinth
Picturehouse


8.3

based on 37 reviews
Read critic reviews
How did we calculate this?

based on 957 votes
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Rate this movie

FILM:

MPAA RATING: R for graphic violence and some language

Starring Ivana Baquero, Sergi López, Maribel Verdú, Ariadna Gil, Doug Jones, Álex Angulo, Roger Casamajor, and César Vea

Guillermo del Toro delivers a unique, richly-imagined epic with Pan's Labyrinth, a gothic fairy tale set against the postwar repression of Franco's Spain.

GENRE(S):	Drama \| Fantasy \| Foreign \| Horror \| Suspense/Thriller
WRITTEN BY:	Guillermo del Toro
DIRECTED BY:	Guillermo del Toro
RELEASE DATE:	DVD: May 15, 2007 Theatrical: December 29, 2006
RUNNING TIME:	119 minutes, Color
ORIGIN:	Mexico / Spain / USA
LANGUAGE(S):	Spanish (with English subtitles)

Received a total of 6 Academy Award nominations. Nominated, Golden Palm, 2006 Cannes Film Festival; Nominated Best Cinematography and Best Feature, 2007 Independent Spirit Awards. Original title "El Laberinto del Fauno."

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

100

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Liam Lacey

This is like no movie you've seen before, a haunting mixture of horror, history and fantasy that works simultaneously on every level.

100

LA Weekly Ella Taylor

Pan's Labyrinth Like his terrific 2001 "The Devil’s Backbone," Mexican horrormeister Guillermo del Toro's new movie offers us both real-life and fantastical monsters, and if you know his work, you won't waste time figuring out which to root for.

100

Chicago Tribune Michael Wilmington

A brilliant work of the imagination capable of truly seizing and igniting our fantasies.

100

Wall Street Journal Joe Morgenstern

The result of the intricate interplay is a fairy tale for adults that is violent, sometimes shocking, yet utterly engrossing. And eerily instructive; it deepens our emotional understanding of fascism, and of rigid ideology's dire consequences.

100

The New York Times A.O. Scott

A swift and accessible entertainment, blunt in its power and exquisite in its effects.

100

Chicago Reader Jonathan Rosenbaum

Unlike most horror movies, this chiller gives equal prominence to reality and fantasy, though the reality is far more frightening. The only precedent that comes to mind in terms of a lyrical treatment of a child's experience of terror is "The Night of the Hunter."

100

TV Guide Maitland McDonagh

Del Toro's film ranks with the best examinations of children's inner lives, but be warned: Its haunting insights are best left to adults.

100

New York Daily News Jack Mathews

A critic trots out the word "masterpiece" at his own peril, but there it is.

100

New York Post Lou Lumenick

Nothing this year comes close to being as utterly unforgettable as Guillermo del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth, an extremely dark and disturbing fairy tale for audiences say, ages 12 and up.

100

San Francisco Chronicle Ruthe Stein

Visually stunning, it meshes haunting images with a complex multilevel story about the enchantment of youth.

100

Premiere Glenn Kenny

This intense film, a mix of horror, fantasy, and history that convinces on all those levels and mixes them up with dizzying brio, is a searing cinematic experience, a beautiful, terrifying vision from writer-director Guillermo del Toro.

100

Village Voice J. Hoberman

Literally and figuratively marvelous, a rich, daring mix of fantasy and politics.

100

Rolling Stone Peter Travers

Del Toro never coddles the audience. He means us to leave Pan's Labyrinth shaken to our souls. He succeeds.

100

Christian Science Monitor Peter Rainer

In tone, Pan's Labyrinth resembles a cross between "Alice in Wonderland" and H.P. Lovecraft, with some Buñuel thrown in for good measure. It is a tribute to - as well as a prime example of - the disturbing power of imagination.

100

Seattle Post-Intelligencer Sean Axmaker

Like the folk tales from centuries past, Pan's Labyrinth is a dark odyssey with nightmarish visions and cruel threats, but coming through the sacrifice and suffering is the childlike belief in magic and imagination that for Del Toro represents the hope and optimism of a happily ever after in this cruel world.

100

Austin Chronicle Marjorie Baumgarten

These creatures of the underworld are the fervid fabrications of del Toro's imagination: More than once they will catch you by surprise and make you gasp.

100

Boston Globe Wesley Morris

Pan's Labyrinth is a transcendent work of art.

100

Miami Herald Rene Rodriguez

It leaves you feeling exhilarated at the invigorating power a well-told story, no matter its subject, can have. If you like Harry Potter, you will love this movie. If you don't like Harry Potter, you will still love this movie.

100

Philadelphia Inquirer Carrie Rickey

This is the breakthrough work of one of world cinema's most visionary artists.

100

Washington Post Ann Hornaday

With this film, del Toro seems to have created his manifesto, a tour de force of cautionary zeal, humanism and magic. At this writing, Pan's Labyrinth is the best-reviewed film of 2006 listed on the movie review Web site Metacritic.com, and for a reason: It's just that great.

100

Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum

Like any great myth, Pan's Labyrinth encodes its messages through displays of magic. And like any good fairy tale, it is also embroidered with threads of death and loss.

100

Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman

We don't find out until the last scene how reality and fantasy intersect, when the meaning of the first shot of the film gets driven home. How many movies have you seen with a payoff like that?

100

Portland Oregonian Shawn Levy

Del Toro presents one dazzling visual spectacle after another.

100

Baltimore Sun Michael Sragow

With a surgical saw instead of a hatchet, del Toro takes apart patriarchy and opportunistic religion as well as fascism.

100

Empire Kim Newman

Dark, twisted and beautiful, this entwines fairy-tale fantasy with war-movie horror to startling effect.

100

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

One of the greatest of all fantasy films.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Noel Murray

After two hours of dazzlingly fantastical images and stomach-turning gore, del Toro winds around, and finds his story's center.

The New Yorker Anthony Lane

So smartly has del Toro thought his fable through, and so graceful is his grasp of visual rhyme, that to pick holes in it seems mean; yet Pan's Labyrinth is perhaps more dazzling than involving--I was too busy reading its runes and clues, as it were, to be swept away. It is, I suspect, a film to return to, like a country waiting to be explored: a maze of dead ends and new life.

Film Threat Don R. Lewis

The action scenes are exciting, the fantasy scenes are creative and the war scenes are brutal.

Los Angeles Times Kenneth Turan

With Pan's Labyrinth, Del Toro has made his most accomplished film to date, a dark and disturbing fairy tale for adults that's been thought out to the nth degree and resonates with the irresistible inevitability of a timeless myth.

Salon.com Stephanie Zacharek

This is a true fairy tale, and one of the finest fantasy pictures ever made, but please do not take your young children to see it unless you want them to be scarred for life.

ReelViews James Berardinelli

The lack of family friendliness does not diminish what del Toro has achieved with this magical motion picture.

USA Today Claudia Puig

Pan's Labyrinth artfully fuses a war film with a family melodrama and a fairy tale. The result is visually stunning and emotionally shattering.

New York Magazine David Edelstein

His palette here is deep-toned, with bottomless blacks and supersaturated oranges and blues--as if the Walt Disney of "Pinocchio" had collaborated with Goya.

Newsweek David Ansen

Suspended between the brutally graphic and flights of lyrical fancy, Pan's Labyrinth unfolds with the confidence of a classical fable, one that paradoxically feels both timeless and startlingly new.

The Hollywood Reporter Ray Bennett

The performers are all good with Baquero poised and beautiful as Ofelia and Verdu vital and spirited as the rebellious Mercedes. Lopez gives an extraordinary performance as the bestial captain, an irredeemable villain to rank with Ralph Fiennes' Nazi in "Schindler's List."

Variety Justin Chang

There's plenty of blood -- both literal and figurative -- coursing through the veins of Pan's Labyrinth, a richly imagined and exquisitely violent fantasy from writer-director Guillermo del Toro.

The average user rating for this movie is 8.3 (out of 10) based on 957 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Dre H gave it a10:
Those who gave this movie below a 7 probably aren't very credible voters. This movie is beautiful on so many levels. This movie isn't slow. This movie isn't for those with ADD, this isnt a fast action thriller... I thin a lot of people do not realize that this is not an American made movie, but are judging i on American standards.

Rob K gave it a10:
Without a doubt, this is the epitome of cinema. Everything in the movie is so beautiful. I wish the people giving the movie bad ratings had the patience could go half of a second without seeing someone get shot. It's not that kind of movie.

Bryan L gave it a2:
Variety reviewer Justin Chang calls the violence in Pan's Labyrinth "exquisite." I suppose Del Toro's bloodlust is shared by all critics, since its Metacritic score is 100. I don't abhor violent movies. But the violence here is overly gorey and in your face though not in a Kill Bill way. Despite the title, little time is spent among fairies and such, but when they do appear, their horrific appearances and actions elicit almost no terror from the certifiable little girl around whom the (lack of?) plot revolves. Slow, drab, boring, disturbing, and without anything positive to say, Pan's Labyrinth is one of the worst movies I've seen. Now if only I had savored all those delectable torture scenes and exploding brains like the "pro" critics seem to have done.

Matt C gave it a3:
Pretty slow and terrible movie, in my opinion. The best part was when it ended. Who comes up with this crap, and why does it get such a high rating?? It's on the "All-Time Highest Rated" chart? Are you kidding?

mike k gave it a10:
I was lucky enough that a theater in my area had this gem and me and my sisters and friends went and at first they where like whats with the spanish language and subs and about ten minutes in that was gone now thinking back i couldn't see this movie being that great in English but something about the way the actors present the language makes the movie feel magical and like it lifts you to another place you have never been before and when i left the theater that night something happened that hadn't before no one was talking that's how blown away by this film it is a must see for anyone who thinks out side the box.

goodmovie lolz gave it a10:
Kevin c is incredibly ignorant. this movie is brilliant. im sorry that some of you are too stupid to understand it.

ashlee b gave it a9:
We watched this movie for our fantasy english class..im only 17 and i thought it was great.. it was an incredibly disturbing movie to watch but it has a whole lot of meening behind it which im still trying to understand.. i think its such a good movie and recomend it highly =] I think that anyone who rates it that lowely clearly doesnt have a very broad imagination and is too set on the real world and thats finee.. just dont watch fantasy films.

Pan's Labyrinth Picturehouse

Pan's Labyrinth
Picturehouse